Variety Show

Last Friday was our church's annual Variety Show. Our children begged us (literally for months) to let them participate. And then, days before the event, they fretted and fumed and feigned blindness and frantically tried to find a way out.

But in the end, they performed and loved it.

And so did we.

First up was a surprise to us. Gideon and Salem (3) and the part of their Sunday School class that made it to the show sang songs. We had no idea they were going to do this. Why is it that the only secrets they can keep are from their parents?

(There are several videos embedded in this post. E-mail subscribers may need to click over.) And also, fair warning: all of these videos are of the quality that accompanies a 12-mo. old sharing a lap with a 25-week old baby bump and a Mama trying to hold a camera steady while both babies kick and squirm. 

Gideon is on the left, Salem is in the middle, and their friend Aaron is on the right. Their Sunday School teachers are in front of them.

Abraham and Miriam (7) were the next up. They performed "Don't Suck Your Thumb," a poem.

Benjamin (11), played two selections:

Lily (9) played two selections:

And finally, Eden (6) performed "Cartwheels: A Series of Three."

The surprise performance of Gideon and Salem meant that Jonathan (4) was the only child (excepting Ada, and 4-year olds do. not. count. the baby) who didn't perform. He was duly miffed. So when we got home, he showed Grandpa and Grandma how he can scale the doorways and hang from the top of the door frame.

Next year, we will be sure to include him.

The rest of the show was fantastic. We heard trumpet, saxophone, guitar, accomplished piano, comedy routines, storytelling, memory recitation, singing, yodeling, and more. We sat there and digested the best meal we'd had all week (a BBQ hosted before the show by one of the families...and I mean completely hosted...brisket, rolls, baked beans, macaroni and cheese, two different kinds of cole slaw, cookies, cobbler...).

It was a slice of small valley church life, and it was a scrumptious slice. We're already talking about what to do next year (but not yet inventing the illnesses to get out of it).